FIELD NOTES CHECKS HARVEST PROGRESS WITH KANSAS FARMER LOWELL NEITZEL

SEPTEMBER 2018

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(Posted Fri. Sep 21st, 2018)

This week, the National Corn Growers Association continued its eighth season of Field Notes, a series that takes readers behind the farm gate to follow the year in the life of American farm families. While these growers come from diverse geographic areas and run unique operations, they share a common love for U.S. agriculture and the basic values that underpin life in farming communities.

Today, Field Notes caught up with Lowell Neitzel, who farms near Lawrence, Kansas. With this year’s harvest already well underway, he characterizes the crop condition as “brutal,” with stalk brittleness necessitating extreme care in harvesting.

“We have about 650 acres of corn left to harvest, and we should be finished up some time next week,” said Neitzel. “Local elevators, given the decreased production projections that they have had due to the weather this summer, aren’t having storage issues as they have in the past few years.”

Despite early expectations of uniformly low yields due to drought, he has seen better-than-expected production from the corn crop planted in some of his better soil.